LGBT+ History Month

Nadia Whittome Excerpts

Thursday 12th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered LGBT+ History Month.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for approving this debate. I am pleased that it has become a regular fixture of the calendar in the world’s gayest Parliament. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow and Gateshead East (Kate Osborne), who made the application with me and whose relentless work for LGBTQ+ rights inspires me every day, not least her victory at the Council of Europe, where her report on banning conversion practices passed with a resounding majority. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I am pleased that the Government have confirmed that they will publish a draft Bill to that end, and I hope the Minister will use today as an opportunity to set out more details and timelines.

I appreciate the irony of one of the younger LGBTQ+ MPs opening a debate about LGBTQ+ history. Luckily, I respect my elders, so if any of my colleagues who lived through that history would like to intervene, correct me if I am getting it wrong and reveal how old they are, they will be more than welcome—although I am confident that even the most senior among them will not be able to recall ancient Greece, which I will mention later.

I do think, however, that it is appropriate for someone like me to open the debate, because in so many ways I am a product of LGBTQ history. The life I lead today —that I am able to be an openly queer MP, that I was taught in school about LGBTQ+ people, that I can marry my girlfriend if we so choose, that discrimination against me is banned—is because of the struggle of generation upon generation of LGBTQ+ people, from the Gay Liberation Front to those who overturned section 28, from Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners to those who set up Switchboard, and from anti-AIDS activists to the gay MPs upon whose shoulders we stand. They include Maureen Colquhoun, the first openly lesbian Member of this House, who fought tirelessly for gender equality and sex workers’ rights, and Chris Smith, who came out in 1984 at a rally against gay employees being banned from his local council. Thanks to the last Labour Government responding to the LGBTQ+ rights movement, the age of consent was equalised, section 28 was repealed, civil partnerships were granted, same-sex couples can adopt, trans people can have their gender legally recognised and the Equality Act 2010 was passed.

I feel immensely grateful to those who came before me that I did not experience many of the horrors that they did. I wish that those who are no longer with us could see us now: the record numbers who are comfortable and safe identifying as their true selves and who live better and more equal lives because of everything that they fought for.

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank my hon. Friend for making such a powerful and passionate speech. She is such a fantastic advocate for the LGBT+ community, and she has highlighted the many people who have passed on. As she will know, I am one of the co-chairs of the all-party group on HIV, AIDS and sexual health, which still have a disgraceful stigma attached to them. Does she agree that, with the science and innovation theme of this year’s LGBTQ+ History Month, we should celebrate science and innovation across the HIV and AIDS sector along with this Government’s fight to ensure we are one of the first countries to end new HIV transmissions by 2030?

[Nadia Whittome]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend and I congratulate her on all her work on this since we were elected together in 2019. She is absolutely right and I commend the Government for their work in this area.

At the same time, we must acknowledge that many in our community continue to suffer, both here and around the world. I am proud to be the co-chair of the APPG on global lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT+) rights. The situation for our siblings internationally varies immensely from place to place. In 65 countries—that is a third of all states—LGBTQ+ people are still criminalised because of who they are and who they love. While we see progress in some places, in others new discriminatory laws and policies continue to be introduced.

Unfortunately, the UK is one of the places where the state of LGBTQ+ rights has been getting worse instead of better. In preparation for today, I rewatched the speech made in 2023 by, if I may, lesbian icon and my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle). I was struck by her reflection that she would scarcely have believed the progress that has been made in the three decades since she was first elected in 1992. I am devastated that I cannot say the same for my time here. During the past six years that I have been an MP, progress has not only stalled but things have gone backwards.

Last year, the UK dropped six places to 22nd in ILGA-Europe’s ranking of LGBTQ+ rights in European countries. In 2015, we were No. 1. The only other countries that suffered a similarly dramatic drop last year were Hungary, whose far-right Government banned Pride marches, and Georgia, which is implementing Russian-style anti-LGBTQ laws. ILGA-Europe has been explicit that the Supreme Court ruling and the subsequent interim guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission are the cause of our regression, as trans people in this country can no longer fully obtain legal gender recognition. Many now live in fear of being terrorised out of public life, whether through discrimination, abuse and violence from those who have been emboldened to become the gender police, or through endless legal threats forcing more and more spaces to exclude them.

We have to ask: what is the endgame here? What do people opposed to trans inclusion want trans people to do—live segregated lives that violate their privacy and dignity, and be forced back into the closet and somehow to stop existing? What about intersex people? What are they meant to do when their biological sex has always been more complicated than simply male or female? That is why I think that this month also acts as an important corrective to the lie that anti-trans activists often tell that sex is binary and that until recently gender identity was straightforward—man have penis, woman have vagina, trans people do not exist. Tell that to Roberta Cowell, the first known British trans woman to undergo gender-affirming surgery and have her birth certificate changed in 1951, or to Charley Wilson, a trans man and ship’s painter from the Victorian era, or to Eleanor Rykener, who was a trans, 14th-century embroiderer, barmaid and sex worker. Tell that, too, to intersex people who have been documented in texts from as far back as ancient Greek, Roman and Indian times, to the two-spirit people of indigenous north Americans or to the hijra in south Asia.

As countless biologists, psychologists and societies across the world will attest, both gender identity and sex have always been complex, diverse and not simply defined by the genitalia that those opposed to trans rights, along with the media, are so obsessed with discussing. It is also not the case that more trans people have just appeared out of nowhere in recent years. Trans people have always existed, trans people will always exist and we should be proud that more people finally feel able to live as their true selves, rather than hide in shame and fear with dire consequences for their mental health.

We should celebrate that, alongside the record numbers of people identifying as gay, lesbian and bisexual. Instead, a vocal minority hopes that if we make trans people’s lives as difficult as possible, if they are hounded and abused, maybe we can get back to a mythical time when they could pretend that trans people did not exist, when gay people were not in their face and when women knew their place. Let me be clear, the roll-back of rights is all linked, and efforts to narrow the definition of womanhood, police people’s gender expression and tie women to our biology are a patriarchal and homophobic wet dream. We are already seeing how the Supreme Court ruling and interim EHRC guidance are leading to women—cis as well as trans—being challenged and harassed in toilets and other single-sex spaces. Gender-critical activists have some brass neck claiming that they are advancing our rights through their actions.

I appreciate the separation of powers between the legislature and the judiciary, and that the Supreme Court had the unenviable job of attempting to interpret the will of Parliament when making its ruling. I also appreciate that this Government therefore had no hand in the decision—but they are far from powerless. The interim guidance from the EHRC went far beyond even the Supreme Court’s ruling; we must ensure that the statutory guidance does not do the same. I hope the Minister can provide an update on where they are on that and confirm that the guidance will enable organisations to be inclusive of trans people instead of mandating their exclusion.

Parliament could legislate to make clear our intention in the Equality Act. I do not believe for a second that that landmark piece of equality legislation passed by the last Labour Government, after the Gender Recognition Act 2004, intended the blanket exclusion of trans people. If the law needs to be clarified, Parliament should make that clarification. We should not be triangulating on issues of human rights. We should not allow trans people to be thrown under the bus in an attempt to appease a tiny, well-funded, radicalised minority who are not representative of women or the rest of the LGBTQ+ community. All of us in the House have a duty to all our LGBTQ+ constituents, including trans people.

Trans people are the frequent topic of debate in this House, yet they have no ability to contribute to it. We must amplify their voices, experiences and concerns, and they are demanding that we oppose their exclusion. As a queer woman, I feel a particular debt to the trans community, because they fought for the rights that I enjoy today. They were on the Pride marches, they were at the die-ins, they lobbied their MPs, and I benefited from it. What kind of person would I be to pull up the ladder when the LGBTQ+ community has always been and will always be one, in struggle and in joy? There is no LGB without the T. We rise together and we fall together, and we must not let our trans siblings’ rights be taken.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadia Whittome]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I had no idea I was expected to wind up.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

There is no need to wind up, if the hon. Member does not want to.

[Nadia Whittome]

I just want to thank everyone so much for taking part in the debate. Everyone made incredibly powerful contributions, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Tom Hayes). I hope that the Government—and, indeed, everyone—heed his words.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

As I am sure Members will agree, that was the best wind-up ever.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered LGBT+ History Month.